The delivered user experience of thin clients, the good, the bad and the ugly

Table of Contents

The last couple of years we’ve seen a steady increase in the GPU usage in VDI environments. With the changing landscape of GPU enabled applications, adding a GPU to a VDI environment is almost mandatory in order to deliver a great user experience. Often the connecting device is forgotten while building these GPU enabled VDI environments. In this research the focus is shifted from the VDI to the connecting device and show the importance of the device for the user experience.

Landscape of the GPU’s

There are three major competitors in the VDI GPU market:

  • NVIDIA
  • AMD
  • Intel

Currently NVIDIA is dominating the market share when it comes to GPU’s in VDI environments. Microsoft recently introduced new GPU enabled desktops using AMD GPU’s. At this point Intel is a niche player in the market.

Application landscape is changing nowadays. Previously, GPUs reigned supreme in VDI’s environments where there was a very clear need of 3D acceleration, like AutoCAD. Nowadays more applications can leverage the usage of a GPU. Applications like Microsoft Office can take full advantage of the GPU and even Windows 10 itself can hugely benefit from a GPU.

In a recent poll on Twitter we asked people the most important factor to consider dealing with DaaS and VDI.